Rachel Yurkovich

Sport: Track and Field

Nation: United States of America

DOB: October 10, 1986

Hometown: Eugene, OR

Career Highlights: A three-time silver medalist at the U.S. outdoor championships, Yurkovich is an outside threat to earn a medal in javelin in London. The American junior champion and Pan Am junior champion in 2005, Yurkovich cemented her reputation as one of the United States' most promising young track and field athletes during a college career that saw her win the NCAA championship in 2008 and 2009. At the world championships in Berlin in 2009 she became the first American woman to qualify for a world final in 25 years, finishing 12th. Having been a runner-up at the USA Outdoors in three consecutive years, Yurkovich finished fourth at the Olympic trials to claim a place in London. Compatriots Brittany Borman and Kara Patterson go into the Olympics in stronger form, while South Africa’s Sunette Viljoen and the Czech Republic's Barbora Spotakova are comfortably the in-form javelin throwers this season.

Olympic History: 2008